Royal Institution
My dear Playfair, I am very much obliged to you for your kind and flattering letter. The subject2 was mentioned to me some days ago by a mutual friend of ours:3 I will tell you my feelings on the matter. In this first place it would be strongly against my inclination to become a candidate for the post4: the influences must be very cogent which would overcome this repugnance on my part. —I dislike election contests of all kinds. In the next place the income, even in its amended form, would be less than what I am [now] making in London. They give me £300 a year for 12 lectures at the Royal Institution:5 my income from the School of Mines will, even at the commencement, be £250 a year; my military examinerships are another 100, and an additional hundred may be set down from other sources. Set this beside the sum you mention, and above all take into account my connexions in London, the cordial relationship in which I stand with Faraday, and I think when you take a balance you could hardly advise me to become a candidate for the Edinburgh Chair. My strongest inducement would be the hope of being able to found a school of experimental physics there, but, this I hope to do eventually in London
With very many thanks | believe me dear Playfair | most truly yours | John Tyndall
RI MS JT/1/T/1126
RI MS JT/1/TYP3/986
[10-11 November 1859]: There is a presumed draft version of this letter which included further details on Tyndall’s considerations for not taking up the post (RI MS JT/1/T/1127, RI MS JT/1/TYP/3/987), ‘My dear Playfair, The subject of the note which you have so kindly written to me was communicated to me a few days ago by a mutual friend of ours.— There is a great deal in the position which is attractive to me: it is a whole and single thing & would do away with the distraction of incidental work. There is also the possibility of founding a school of true experimental physics in the country which it as yet lacks. There is on the other hand my connexions here in London many of which are near and dear to me. Above them all stands the cordial relationship which subsists between Faraday and me & which has grown only firmer as years have advanced. Sir David Brewster did me the honour to offer me the Chair of St. Andrews some months ago, but the above considerations induced me to decline it. Since that time Sir Roderick Murchison has written to me the handsomest terms, offering me a Chair of Physics in the School of Mines—this I have accepted. With regard then to income the matter stands thus: They allow me at the Royal Institution £300 for twelve lectures annually:—thus cutting off 7 of my lectures and augmenting my salary by £100—The latter act of kindness was performed without my knowing that it was at all in contemplation. My income from the school of mines will, even at the commencement be between two and three hundred a year. My examinerships are worth at least £100 more. Add 100 to this, which I cannot help making from other sources, even if [I tried] to do so, and you have a total of between seven & eight hundred a year. In the most favourable case the chair at Edinburgh appears to be worth no more than £650. The whole case is now before you, and I think you will agree with me that the balance of influence is on the side of my remaining where I am.’
the subject: see letter 1645.
has written to me: likely refer to a missing letter from Murchison, which Tyndall discussed in letter 1635 to Hirst.
the post: The Chair of Physics at the University of Edinburgh (see letter 1645, n. 3).
[the Royal Institution]: Tyndall’s financial situation had recently improved, see letter 1596, n. 3.
Please cite as “Tyndall1646,” in Ɛpsilon: The John Tyndall Collection accessed on